BORN ON STAGE

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 822, 16 November 1929, Page 5

BORN ON STAGE

PRODUCER GEORGE HIGHLAND 3 WHO MAKES STARS ] GETS WHAT HE WANTS 4 The producer was feeling uneasy. \ He wanted his cabin-trunks and a A i hot bath and a change of linen. Probably the best time to interview A Mr. George Highland, producer of J. 1 C. Williamson's most spectacular pro- A duct ions, was not when he had just \ arrived by train from Wellington. i But printing presses cannot wait for \ changes of linen, and the producer a was asked to produce an interview. fl ‘‘All right.” he remarked, after confiding to a Sun representative that his { trunks were in the hotel lift and on the way to his room. "I was practi- j t ally born on the stage—my people , I were stage people, so it was in the / I blood.” ‘ Mr. Highland does not mind admit- ! ting that he began in a humble posi- i * tion in the world of limelight and; make-believe. "I was a call boy and ( I sold programmes and did all sorts j , of things round the theatre until I was j j IS years old. i " i “One morning the producer was 'i < taken ill. 1 told them that I could! * , take hi.s place, and I did. That was 32 j i j years ago. and I’ve been producing | ( ever since.” GET WHAT YOU WANT ( "Get what you want and don't be j i satisfied until you've got what you I I want. That is Mr. Highland's maxim. | . Determination seems also to have i | ; played no small part in his career—j that and the ability to get what he \ { : wants. 1 ' i At lit Mr. Highland was in America j j with the late Sir Henry Irving, and I ' 1 the late Dame Ellen Terry, producing [ i mob scenes and the like in their New j ‘ York productions. After ten and a- I , I half months he was back in England ; I j again with an assured future as a j . I producer. Back to the States again (

j with Charles Frohman, who was drowned when the Lusitania was sunk I •: during the war. Then in 1917 hell I Paid his first visit to Australia and. j ; except for periodical trips to Eng- I • • land and the States, he has stayed j j there ever since. Most of the Australian actors and 1 actresses who have attained fame | abroad can thank Mr. Highland for I their success. j “Yes. 1 took 'em out of the chorus j and made stars of them,” he raps out. j “If you are a producer you must have - | the natural ability to pick winners.” And then he mentioned some of the I little chorus girls who are now clraw- ■ it's large salaries in England or I America—Madge Elliott, who is now | a London star. Josie Melville, who ■ | may come back to Australia for “Mr. j Cinders,” Clarice I-lardwicke, now I appearing at Drury Lane, Isobel Wil- _; ford, who occasionally figures in the i | cable news, Adele Crane, Dorothy Seacombe. Eve Gray, Mabel Gibson, now j in Hollywood. Marie Bremner, Gladys I Moncrieff. And there are men, too. Mr. Highland took Cyril Ritchard from I the chorus. He now stars with Madge Elliott in London musical comedies, e | Harry Ratcliffe is now with Zeigfeki ii j Follies in New York. | These are only a few. The firm will not bring Noel Coward’s operetta “Bitter Sweet" out to j 1 this side—they lost £15.000 with I I liis A ear of Grace.” Good shows j are hard to find. “The Australian t. public has been fed on strawberries i [ and cream as far as the theatre is [ • concerned." he will tell you. “Now I they like tin-pan noises from Tin Pan = ; Alley." 3 j During his stay in Auckland Mr. i Highland will put "The Desert Song” company through a new production, "New Moon." And he is going to | work very, very hard. So is the, company. __________